Rep. Nancy Jenkins, R-Clayton, remained noncommittal and Sen. Bruce Caswell, R-Pittsford, has proposed his own alternative to the proposed Medicaid expansion under the federal Affordable Care Act.

The expansion would cover more than 400,000 people in the state. The federal government would pay the total cost for the first three years and would continue to pay 90 percent of the cost beginning in 2020, with the state gradually picking up 10 percent by then.

Gov. Rick Snyder supports the expansion, but Republicans in the Legislature have removed his appropriation for the program in the proposed budget for the upcoming fiscal year.

Snyder has estimated a $103 million savings to the budget for the first year of the plan, leading to a total $575 million savings by 2019-20, with the state using the savings to pay its future share of the expansion costs.

"I think there's a lot of questions out there still," Jenkins said Thursday after a presentation about the new health care law by Brett Williams, mid-Michigan regional coordinator for Michigan Consumers for Healthcare.

"My concerns are, if we expand it, I know the federal government is going to be covering part of the cost, but you know, we're going to be having to pick up the rest of the cost," Jenkins said.

Some aspects of the law are still changing, Jenkins said.

"We don't know fully what's involved in all of this, and that's what's frustrating about the whole thing. We're committing the state to something that we don't necessarily know all the answers to."

Caswell's plan envisions a state-controlled plan for about 210,000 people who would not be eligible for Medicaid without the expansion and who could not access the health care marketplace, or exchange, envisioned under the Affordable Care Act.

The state would pay for the plan with $170 million from the general fund for community mental health agencies, $50 million from a Blue Cross subsidy to the state for the next 18 years and $30 million from savings achieved by shutting down another program, according to the plan.